The newspaper advertisement for volunteers to accompany Ernest Shackleton on his planned traverse of Antarctica in 1914 was frank in its offering. “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success.” Still, hundreds applied. There were few chances left to be the first to reach the last challenge on Earth. As the 20th Century came of age, explorers had uncovered most of the world’s mysteries, sailing to the far corners of the globe, ascending many of its most forbidding peaks, crossing its greatest deserts and penetrating its thickest jungles. Frozen, alien, inhospitable, dangerous, and close to impossible to reach, there were only two tiny dots on the globe that human beings had not yet set foot on—the North and South Poles. The Greatest Polar Exploration Stories Ever Told is a visceral, exciting and stunning collection of twelve stories recounting the bravery, resoluteness, and strength of the men who willingly traversed frozen hells to be the first to reach the North or South Pole. It is a collection that will both inspire and inform—and answer questions about the limits of human endurance. Many men would die during their challenging, frozen journeys, and their deaths were not pleasant. Yet they continued to try again. Here are stories, wrought by the challenging landscape and weather, that made these explorers household names and heroes: Peary, Scott, Amundsen, Shackleton, Franklin,Cherry-Garrard, Scott, Kane, Cook—and others lost to history whose bravery was nonetheless as admirable. Each of these men knew success would bring glory for their countries and financial security and fame and eminent places in history for themselves. Each knew also the odds of success were slim and the chance of dying great. Nations held their collective breaths for news of each expedition and those years later were termed the Heroic Age of Exploration—there were simply no other endeavors that captured the world’s attention the various races to the poles. The Greatest Polar Exploration Stories Ever Told recaptures the spirit, drama, and tragedy of a time in history that will never come again.

An exciting collection of dangerous adventures and groundbreaking exploration, The Best Adventure and Exploration Stories Ever Told compiles the works of authors from all over the world and from the very distant past to recent eras. Popular and well-known authors such as Herman Melville, Jack London, Joseph Conrad, and Jules Verne are featured, as well as Homer’s mythic tales and Iceland’s mesmerizing sagas from the tenth and eleventh centuries. Nonfiction stories add a riveting, realistic aspect of adventure to the collection. These include accounts from Shackleton’s polar expeditions; early American stories from the famed Lewis and Clark; spellbinding accounts of Magellan’s perilous expeditions to uncharted areas; and many more no less exciting. The stories compiled in this priceless collection represent a thousand years of adventure, expedition, danger, and discovery. They inspire as well as awe, and readers will find themselves with an urge to follow in these great adventurers’ footsteps. Ancient and modern escapades placed side by side make this book perfect for all who crave the adrenaline of adventure and discovery. This title is part of Skyhorse’s respected The Best Stories series, each of which is selectively edited and handcrafted to include only the best stories from the best writers of the genre.

Written by Nigel Watson of the Antarctic Heritage Trust, and illustrated with Jane Ussher's stunning photographs, historic images and never-before-seen ephemera, this is the first book to fully document and celebrate the contribution Sir Edmund Hillary and the New Zealand team made to Antarctic history, and the legacy they left behind. Hillary and the team were primarily a support act to the British Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic crossing party. By heading on to the South Pole and reaching it before the crossing party, Hillary created tensions, unleashed a media storm and achieved an historic first overland to the South Pole. Hillary even had the audacity to succeed using three farm tractors. The epic journeys of this expedition added another fascinating chapter to the exploration annals of Antarctica. Hillary and his team laid the foundations for New Zealand's continuous, and increasingly important, presence in Antarctica.

In Gilded Age America, Arctic explorers were fabulous celebrities—assured of riches and near-immortality so long as they reached the North Pole first. Of the many attempts to meet that goal, three American expeditions, launched from the Russian archipelago of Franz Josef Land, ended in abject failure, their exploits consigned to near-oblivion. Even so, these ventures—the Wellman expedition (1898–99), the Baldwin-Ziegler (1901–2), and the Fiala-Ziegler (1903–5)—have much to tell us about the personalities, politics, and economics of exploration in their day. In The Greatest Show in the Arctic, the first book to chronicle all three expeditions, P. J. Capelotti explores what went right and what, in the end, went tragically wrong. The cast of colorful characters from the Franz Josef Land forays included Walter Wellman, a Chicago journalist and bon vivant running from debts, his mistress, and an illegitimate daughter; Evelyn Briggs Baldwin, a deranged meteorologist with a fetish for balloons and a passion for Swedish conserves; and Anthony Fiala, a pious photographer in search of God in the Arctic. Featuring an international cast of supporting characters worthy of a three-ring circus, The Greatest Show in the Arctic follows each of the three expeditions in turn, from spectacular feats of financing to their bitter ends. Along the way, the explorers accumulated considerable geographic knowledge and left a legacy of place-names. Through close study of the expeditions’ journals, Capelotti reveals that the Franz Josef Land endeavors foundered chiefly because of poor leadership and internal friction, not for lack of funding, as historians have previously suspected. Presenting tales of noble intentions, novel inventions, and epic miscalculations, The Greatest Show in the Arctic brings fresh life to a unique and underappreciated story of American exploration.

"I don't regard nature as a spectator sport." -Ed Zern, 1985 Hunting is a serious business-but it's also about camaraderie, achievements and failures, seeing new places, and revisiting cherished ones. The true stories here feature a variety of game, in locations that range from high Yukon Territory mountain peaks to lowland swamps off of Mobile Bay, Alabama. This is an indispensable volume for all lovers and students of the natural world. If your definition of home includes fields and marshes, creeks and river bottoms, plains and mountains, consider this required reading.

Covers the entire history of Arctic and Antarctic exploration, from the voyage of Pytheas ca. 325 B.C. to the present, in one convenient, comprehensive reference resource. Exploring Polar Frontiers: A Historical Encyclopedia is the only reference work that provides a comprehensive history of polar exploration from the ancient period through the present day. The author is a noted polar scholar and offers dramatic accounts of all major explorers and their expeditions, together with separate exploration histories for specific islands, regions, and uncharted waters. He presents a wealth of fascinating information under a variety of subject entries including methods of transport, myths, achievements, and record-breaking activities. By approaching polar exploration biographically, geographically, and topically, Mills reveals a number of intriguing connections between the various explorers, their patrons and times, and the process of discovery in all areas of the polar regions. Furthermore, he provides the reader with a clear understanding of the intellectual climate as well as the dominant social, economic, and political forces surrounding each expedition. Readers will learn why the journeys were undertaken, not just where, when, and how.

This meticulously edited and carefully crafted sea adventure collection by R. M. Ballantyne contains thrilling maritime tales from all over the globe; from cold Polar Regions to hot South Seas. Table of Contents: The Coral Island The Red Eric Fighting the Whales Fast in the Ice Gascoyne The Lifeboat The Lighthouse Shifting Winds Saved by the Lifeboat Erling the Bold The Battle and the Breeze The Cannibal Islands Sunk at Sea The Pirate City The Story of the Rock Under the Waves Jarwin and Cuffy Philosopher Jack The Lonely Island The Giant of the North The Madman and the Pirate The Battery and the Boiler The Young Trawler The Island Queen The Lively Poll Red Rooney The Eagle Cliff The Crew of the Water Wagtail Blown to Bits Charlie to the Rescue The Hot Swamp

Musaicum Books presents to you this unique action & adventure collection with sea adventure novels, western classics, historical thrillers, treasure hunt tales, war stories. Table of Contents: The Coral Island Snowflakes and Sunbeams (The Young Fur Traders) Ungava Martin Rattler The Dog Crusoe and his Master The World of Ice The Gorilla Hunters The Golden Dream The Red Eric Away in the Wilderness Fighting the Whales The Wild Man of the West Fast in the Ice Gascoyne The Lifeboat Chasing the Sun Freaks on the Fells The Lighthouse Fighting The Flames Silver Lake Deep Down Shifting Winds Hunting the Lions Over the Rocky Mountains Saved by the Lifeboat Erling the Bold The Battle and the Breeze The Cannibal Islands Lost in the Forest Digging for Gold Sunk at Sea The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands The Iron Horse The Norsemen in the West The Pioneers Black Ivory Life in the Red Brigade Fort Desolation The Pirate City The Story of the Rock Rivers of Ice Under the Waves The Settler and the Savage In the Track of the Troops Jarwin and Cuffy Philosopher Jack Post Haste The Lonely Island The Red Man's Revenge My Doggie and I The Giant of the North The Madman and the Pirate The Battery and the Boiler The Thorogood Family The Young Trawler Dusty Diamonds, Cut and Polished Twice Bought The Island Queen The Rover of the Andes The Prairie Chief The Lively Poll Red Rooney The Big Otter The Fugitives Blue Lights The Middy and the Moors The Eagle Cliff The Crew of the Water Wagtail Blown to Bits The Garret and the Garden Jeff Benson Charlie to the Rescue The Coxswain's Bride The Buffalo Runners The Hot Swamp Hunted and Harried The Walrus Hunters Wrecked but not Ruined Six Months at the Cape Memoirs: Personal Reminiscences in Book Making

This carefully edited Ballantyne collection has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices. Table of Contents: Novels: The Coral Island Snowflakes and Sunbeams (The Young Fur Traders) Ungava Martin Rattler The Dog Crusoe and his Master The World of Ice The Gorilla Hunters The Golden Dream The Red Eric Away in the Wilderness Fighting the Whales The Wild Man of the West Fast in the Ice Gascoyne The Lifeboat Chasing the Sun Freaks on the Fells The Lighthouse Fighting The Flames Silver Lake Deep Down Shifting Winds Hunting the Lions Over the Rocky Mountains Saved by the Lifeboat Erling the Bold The Battle and the Breeze The Cannibal Islands Lost in the Forest Digging for Gold Sunk at Sea The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands The Iron Horse The Norsemen in the West The Pioneers Black Ivory Life in the Red Brigade Fort Desolation The Pirate City The Story of the Rock Rivers of Ice Under the Waves The Settler and the Savage In the Track of the Troops Jarwin and Cuffy Philosopher Jack Post Haste The Lonely Island The Red Man's Revenge My Doggie and I The Giant of the North The Madman and the Pirate The Battery and the Boiler The Thorogood Family The Young Trawler Dusty Diamonds, Cut and Polished Twice Bought The Island Queen The Rover of the Andes The Prairie Chief The Lively Poll Red Rooney The Big Otter The Fugitives Blue Lights The Middy and the Moors The Eagle Cliff The Crew of the Water Wagtail Blown to Bits The Garret and the Garden Jeff Benson Charlie to the Rescue The Coxswain's Bride The Buffalo Runners The Hot Swamp Hunted and Harried The Walrus Hunters Wrecked but not Ruined Children's Books: Three Little Kittens The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast Mister Fox The Life of a Ship My Mother Other Works: The Hudson's Bay Company Handbook to the new Goldfields Up in the Clouds: Balloon Voyages Man on the Ocean: A Book about Boats and Ships The Ocean and its Wonders Six Months at the Cape Battles with the Sea Memoirs: Personal Reminiscences in Book Making

Issues for Nov. 1957- include section: Accessions. Aanwinste, Sept. 1957-